You could say it was a formula game for the Colorado Mesa Mavericks.
Strong pitching, timely hitting, and another win at Suplizio has become the norm for CMU at home this season. JR McDermott’s strong performance and a timely rally gave the Mavericks a 5-2 victory, their 23rd win, against Colorado Christian University (losers of six of their past seven) Friday night in a conference matchup that featured some competitive banter.
McDermott picked off Connor Marschall at first base for the third out in the top of the third and gave a long look to Marschall as he walked off the mound towards the dugout.
“I mean we kinda crave the, I guess hate if you know what I’m saying,” McDermott said. “We just thrive on it. The more pressure that’s out there I feel like this team is going to perform at an even higher level. It’s just going to increase as we go.”
“That was timely for us and we executed it well,” CMU coach Chris Hanks said.
The momentum helped McDermott turn in another quality outing. The senior went 8.0 innings and gave up two runs, five hits, four walks with eight strikeouts. He’s thrown a quality start in all eight of his starts this season and improved his earned run average to 1.70. His ERA sits second in the RMAC behind fellow teammate Garrett Hutson (1.69).
CMU had trouble early against CCU right-hander Alex Ginn who came into the game with a 7.71 ERA. The righty fired darts through the first few innings against the Mavericks and painted the outside corners with an electric fastball.
“Colorado Christian’s been playing everybody tough,” Hanks said. “I don’t think we’re as sharp as we need to be right now but [Ginn] pitched well and kept us off balance. But we manufactured some runs there in the fourth and got it going and JR pitched well enough to keep us in the game.”
McDermott allowed six baserunners through the first four innings but escaped unscathed each time. The senior’s ability to strand runners this season has been a large reason why he sports the
“I made a little bit of a mistake there and he guessed right and it happens. I just lock it back in and try to execute pitches a little better,” McDermott said.
The strong Maverick lineup wouldn’t be held scoreless for long against Ginn, however. In the fourth, after a Jordan Stubbings single, bunt single by Caleb Farmer, and hit by pitch to Spencer Bramwell, the bases were loaded for Trevin Reynolds who poked a two-run single to center to give CMU a 2-0 lead.
“Once you see them the first time it gets a little bit easier the second time,” Reynolds said. “You know what he’s going to throw and you see the window he’s coming from and see the ball a little better. I was just looking for a ball up whether it was fastball or slider. Just try to do my job and get at least one run in. It just worked out that it flared out and I got a couple in. Baseball’s a game of inches.”
A wild pitch brought Bramwell home and two batters later Chase Hamilton capped a four-run inning with a sacrifice fly to center.
Joel Manzano caught up to McDermott’s fastball in the sixth and parked a two-run home run to right field, just out of the reach of right fielder Hunter Douglas. McDermott didn’t let the home run faze him and struck out two of the next three batters to end the top half of the sixth.
Will Dixon added to CMU’s lead with an RBI double down the right-field line. Reynolds picked up his second hit of the game before Dixon’s double with a one-out double to left.
CCU right fielder Carter Mossey had the play of the game that prevented CMU from adding to their lead. With Douglas on second, Dominic DeMarco turned on a 2-2 pitch and sent it to the right-center gap but Mossey extended to his left and stole extra bases from CMU’s third baseman.
Sophomore Frankie Fitzgerald came in for the save and pitched a clean 1-2-3 inning for his second save of the year.
It’s been a fast start for this CMU club and while anything can happen on the diamond, this group feels they’re close to something special
“We’re ready to just take off,” Reynolds said. “It’ll be really something. It’ll be really special when we do that.”
